It has not been without its pitfalls, however. During the Ashes Australian opening batsman Phillip Hughes ‘tweeted’ the fact he had been dropped from the Edgbaston Test before the teams had been announced.

Footballer Darren Bent was forced to apologise after venting his frustrations at Daniel Levy over the delay in finalising his transfer to Sunderland, accusing the Tottenham chairman of “******* around”.

The ECB recently issued a statement after one of the site’s users pretended to be England batsman Ian Bell and official guidelines on use are likely to be formally produced in the wake of Bresnan’s indiscretion.

The NBA became the first sports body to ban the use of social media sites like Twitter and Facebook during matches.

“During games, the use of cell phones, PDAs, other electronic communication devices, and social media or networking sites (including Twitter, Facebook and other sites and services) by coaches, players and other team basketball operations personnel is prohibited,” read a memo.